


Beauty in the beast

by sakkajagga



Category: Devil May Cry
Genre: F/F, F/M, Gen, Other
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-31
Updated: 2019-05-31
Packaged: 2020-04-05 04:38:49
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,774
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19041292
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sakkajagga/pseuds/sakkajagga
Summary: After being left for dead as human sacrifice by a village trapped in its old ways, you come to realize that not all demons may be as horrible as the world believes.





	Beauty in the beast

Despite the fact that you couldn’t very well see your face, you knew that it was reddened and dry from the harsh cold.  The wind blowing just made it all the worse, stinging your eyes, biting at any bit of you it could reach even through your heavy winter ensemble.  Luckily this town’s tavern still had lights on, so if nothing else, you would be able to warm yourself up. As expected for a town not so large, when you walked in, all the patrons paused to look at you for a quick moment of judgement before returning the their own business.  As a well-traveled individual, you’d become used to this, and didn’t even wait for the other’s to decide if they had a problem with you or not and made straight for the bar. He greeted you, wearily, waiting for you to remove the outermost layers of your gear so that you could speak and move properly.

“What can I do for ya?”  He watched as you tucked your belongings against your legs before finally settling down on the seat.

Because you were so focused on him, you didn’t notice that patrons around you were paying closer attention now that your face was visible.  “Warmth, friend. It’s treacherous out there.”

“Aye,” he nodded in agreement, pouring a pint and setting it down in front of you.  “Cheers to that. I’ll get ya some grub to warm the insides as well.”

“I appreciate it,” you raised the mug to him in a small toast, but was unable to enjoy it once a couple of men came over to join you.

“Staying in town long, stranger?” The one your left said as a greeting.

“Just passing through,” you said, watching for signs of trouble.

“That’s a fortunate decision.  Especially with the demon that’s taken up residence just outside the village,” The guy on your right chimed in.

Now that struck you as odd, “A demon?  So far up in these mountains?”

“You think demons are afraid of a little snow?”  Both men laughed, almost in unison, at that thought.  It made you contemplate that statement; you hadn’t heard mention of demons outside cities before as they tended to drift toward and hunt humans for their blood.  What kind of demon would risk starving to death in the mountains on the off chance it ran into a little village like this nestled away between the trees and jagged slopes?  You realized they were still talking to you when both men lifted their own pints up on either side, waiting for you to join their toast, “And we think we’ve finally found the way to get it gone, right friend?”

“All right, fellas,” the barkeep returned, setting a plate heavy with food meant to fill you up and keep you full in front of you before chastising them to let you at least eat. 

You’d never appreciated a stranger more in your life, but unfortunately that didn’t make them leave, but they did stop trying to force you in on toasts.  You spoke with them casually between bites of food, listening to their stories and sightings of the demon that’d been lurking deep in the woods.

Because you were so preoccupied with these two chatterboxes, you were not able to notice the other murmurings in the tavern.  Patrons whispering and talking amongst themselves, causally pointing at you and asking one another if you were the one the town seer had spoken of.  The old seer had predicted the demon’s appearance and was ignored, but once sighted, the entire village looked to him for answers. And just a few nights ago, another vision had come to him.  He saw a lone traveler, describing physical attributes matching your’s exactly, and prophesied that this would be the person to surrender to the demon and would remedy the situation.

The friendliness of these people was a welcomed surprise.  Most smaller communities were against any outsiders whatsoever, however these people were inviting and open; but those stories of the demon had your hair standing on end.  “Hm...didn’t think I was  _ this _ tired…” you said suddenly to one of your new acquaintances.  You wanted to put as much distance between you and this town’s demon problem as soon as possible, but your eyes were getting so heavy.  Not noticing the look they shared, or the fact that they looked to the bartender, who simply nodded, you put a hand to your own forehead, not feeling any fever.  Yet everything was starting to feel more and more like some dream-like state until there was period of time that you were totally unaware of your surroundings. When you came back to your senses, you found that you were on the back of one of the men, slowly coming to realize that he was piggy-backing you through the snow covered forest.  You were groggy and slow to react, having trouble lifting your head and heard the garbled familiar voices pointing out the fact that you were awake. Weakly, you struggled to pull away, words a slurred mess and barely intelligible as you tried to ask them what was going on, where were you, and where were they taking you.

“We have to hurry,” you heard from somewhere behind you.  “Night is falling, surely the demon will be prowling.”

Your heart began thudding as the pieces fell into place the more they talked about their plan and their need to hurry it along.

“W-wait…”  You finally found your voice, but it was still so hard to stay focused.  Even just trying to speak coherently zapped the energy you were able to gather; head dropping back to the man’s shoulder none too gently.  It was a terrifying thing; to be able to register was what happening around you but being literally powerless to do anything about it. Whatever they had slipped you was rendering your limbs practically useless, but luckily for you it was slowly but surely wearing off.

Waiting for the pivotal moment, you suddenly jerked back and drove an elbow into the neck of the man who was carrying you.  It threw him off balance enough to drop you and as soon as you hit the ground, you were scrambling to your feet to get the hell away from them.  It was just unfortunate that you were disoriented and still sluggish enough that it wasn’t long before the group was able to catch up and subdue you once more.  This time they had to contend with you fighting them along the way, but outnumbering you four-to-one helped their success.

“You can’t leave me like this!!”  You pleaded to them as they were finally able to close the iron shackles in place to make sure you couldn’t escape again.  “This is inhumane!!”

“We’re sorry, young one,” one of the elder men said, having the audacity to look apologetic as he knelt to be eye level with you.  “But this is the only way to ensure our survival. As it has been prophesied.” You bared your teeth at him, pulling on the chains binding you between two trees so that your arms were uncomfortably stretched out on either side.  The shackles hurt your wrists, cutting into them the more you pulled. “Rest assured your sacrifice will not be in vain. You shall be remembered always as our savior,” he rose to his feet and took a few steps back, making a prayer motion at you as if to bless you in your final hours of life.

No matter how much you shouted and called out, all the response you got was just your lone voice echoing off the trees.  You thrashed and pulled at the shackles, making your wrists bleed until you couldn’t stand it any longer. The cold reality of no one coming to release you settled in quietly at first, bringing upon you a sense of dread you had never before experienced in your life.  Amidst the snow covering the ground, you noted the splatters of red that had dripped from your arms as you breath escaped in hard, harsh whisps before finally you hunched forward. Exhausted and freezing after hours of being left here to die, you wondered if the villagers were just superstitious...perhaps there was no demon after all and they were cruelly leaving an unfortunate soul here to die due to their own primitive fears.  ‘ _ What a miserable way to die… _ ’ you thought to yourself, finally too cold and tired to keep shredding your wrists anymore than they already were from the metal biting into them in attempt to free yourself.  Drifting in and out of consciousness, you weren’t sure at first if the sound of crunching snow was real or not--hell, you didn’t even know how you registered it. Weak from cold and fatigue, you managed to lift your head from where it hung forward, but unable to turn to look over your shoulder; voice weak and hardly audible when you asked if someone was really there to help you.  Knowing your luck as of late, it was probably just your imagination.

Or at least you wished it was once you caught motion out of the corner of your eye.  The dark color in contrast to the bright white covering the ground and fluttering down from the sky made you think it was a glove, but you noticed first the claws, then the size, then the almost reptilian scales, and the faint glow of the most certainly non-human hand that had reached out and wrenched the shackle confining your right wrist in its grip.  You couldn’t believe the sight of it’s claws alone, let alone fathoming that you were about to come face-to-face with a demon, and then probably immediately eaten thereafter. The metal was crushed as if nothing more than a clod of dirt--but that was all you could register as your breath came in shallow, painful bursts and the world around you went black; your body slumping lifelessly to the ground and embedded in the snow.

 

From what felt like a terrible nightmare, you slowly roused; opening your eyes and greeted by the sight of a dimly lit room, light and shadows casted by a dancing flame twitching across the ceiling and walls as you tiredly surveyed your surroundings.  You didn’t know where you were, but supposed someone must’ve taken pity on you for not being able to handle your alcohol and put you to bed. The place wasn’t fancy by any means, looking quite abandoned if you were honest, but you didn’t want to judge as your gaze landed on the fire and you immediately froze.  Sitting there in front of it was definitely not a human! At least not any human you’d ever met had glowing, spectral wings jutting out of their back!! The sound of your breath catching in your throat was enough to alert the demon that you were awake and it turned to look over its shoulder at you, long silver hair framing its dark features and glowing eyes, reminding you that you had been dragged into the woods and left to die.  It hadn't been a nightmare after all.

Your back slams into the wall behind you as you stumble backwards to put as much space between you and the demon as possible when it moves to get up from its spot on the floor.  The fire is able to give you enough light to see it’s full form; how its scales and jagged edges are illuminated by the supernatural light emanating from the cracks in its hide. It’s mouth opens, and the first thing you notice then are its fangs.

“Don’t eat me!!”  You shout, hoping to either startle it or to cause it to pity you enough to release you, “Just--just let me go--please don’t--Don’t!!”  You’re so terrified that you can’t even form a coherent sentence, let alone hear the fact that the demon was actually trying to talk over you at the same time.

He growls, frustrated, raising clawed hands at his side and tries again to say something, but you shout even more loudly than before, “I’m not even from that village!!  I won’t work as a sacrifice!!!” All the while you’d been shifting bit by bit, inching your way towards the door that didn’t look locked to you as the demon stepped in that circular pattern with you, as if trying to prevent you from getting to his blindspot.  He made another motion, and in the same instant you grabbed the handle of the door and flung it open with all your might before taking off in a dead run.

You don’t know where you’re going, or even if you’re heading towards the same village that had so willingingly offered up an innocent person as a sacrifice for their own personal gain, but you kept running; expecting all the while to look back over your shoulder and find the demon in pursuit.  After a while of sprinting alone through the snowy forest, to catch your breath, you stop and press your body against a large tree to conceal your presence...as if the heavy breathing and puffs of breath into the winter air wouldn’t have been a dead giveaway. Still, so long as you didn’t hear the sounds of being chased, you felt safe enough to rest, doubling over and bracing your hands against your knees as you tried to regulate your breathing.  Noticing something strange, you lift your wrists, examining the bandages that had been carefully wrapped around them in the exact places that the shackles had sliced up the skin from your vehement attempts of escape. You knew for a fact that you hadn’t been bandaged beforehand, which meant...the demon? The thought instantly drove you mad, unable to figure out why a demon would go out of its way to bandage the gashes and stop the bleeding of a human victim.  And furthermore...why hadn’t it already killed you?? Why had it let you rest and wake up? You could only guess it was because it liked its food lively, but that still wasn’t adding up due to the fact that you were out here alone, being very not chased by said demon. It was insane to you. So much so that you turned around and followed the path your feet had made in the snow all the way back to that snowed-in, sad little cabin.

 

He seems just as confused as you are when you’re suddenly bursting through the door that you had previously almost broken your neck to run out of, watching him sink down to a defensive position as if expecting an attack.  You’re so out of sorts that you don’t even care about being freezing again as you hold up your arms, letting the sleeves fall so that your bandaged wrists were exposed and facing him. “Did you wrap my wounds?” The eerie light of his piercing stare glowing from behind silver bangs makes you want to flee all over again, even though the demon merely nods.  “Why?” You watch him draw up to his full height, seeing that the demon would easily tower over you. He doesn’t say anything still and just watches you suspiciously. Him, a demon! Suspicious of you, a human!! “Are you playing some game with me before you kill me and eat my organs?? Why did you save me if the villagers put me out there as a sacrifice for you!?”  It felt a little...insane to be demanding of a demon to know why it hadn’t killed you yet...but it was driving you insane since you had never seen a demon react like this before. So...human.

His face has confusion etched all over it, you’re somehow able to tell even through his beastly appearance; wondering if it can even understand what you were saying to it.  You open your mouth to speak again, but this time he cuts you off. “I don’t know anything about a ‘sacrifice’,” his voice is completely otherworldly; distorted and clear somehow at the same time.  It catches you by surprise just as much as him finally speaking does. “What in the hell are you talking about?”

“But...the villagers…  They said you were demanding sacrifices to spare their lives.”  His face is still confused. “They drugged me! So that you’d kill me and leave them alone!!”

The demon’s reaction was even more shocking than this entire situation.  You swore that his expression became...hurt, dejected even, as he turned away and sat back down in his spot in front of the fire with a disgruntled huff.

Was he...pouting?  You blinked, not really believing your eyes as you watched him sit unmoving and staring into the flames, seemingly ignoring your presence now.  “So…” you cut into the silence after a few long moments, “why did you save me?”

“I wasn’t going to just leave you there to freeze to death,” the demon growled, slouching forward so that his elbows rested on his knees.  His wings rustled, as if he was uncomfortable, before settling again after curling in on his body slightly.

You didn’t know why, but to you, it made him look so...sad.  And lonely. The way his large wings shifted in to come closer made it look like he was self-soothing rather than being just standoffish.  “What’s your name?”

That makes him look at you again, bewilderedly eyeing you as if you were the strange looking one, “What?”

“Your name?” you ask again before introducing yourself to see if that helps.

For a moment it looked as if he wasn’t going to even humor you, clearly hesitant and not trusting whatever he suspected your intentions to be before gruffly answering, “Nero.”

“Well, Nero,” You offered him a smile while he was still looking at you, “do you mind if I sit with you?  I’m...still kinda cold…” Your voice is a little sheepish, feeling a little silly in this bizarre situation.  You’d gone from screaming at him, running away, to barging back in demanding answers of his motives, and asking to cozy up to him to leech the warmth off his fire.

    The shocked look on his face was almost comical given the naturally angry looking features he possessed.  Again, he took a long moment to regard you and your words, wings twitching in place as the jagged bits on his shoulders shifted in what looked to be in a nervous fashion.  Nero doesn’t say anything and merely just scoots over, relinquishing his space and making room for you next to him in front of the fireplace. It’s not a huge hearth so you have to sit rather close to him; noting the way he draws up into himself once you do join him.

    Describing this as awkward would have been an understatement...but given the circumstances, you knew that this could have turned out so much worse for you.  The villagers could have been right about their boogeyman. Nero could have been a vicious, bloodthirsty creature fresh from the depths of hell looking for his next meal and killed you without a second thought.  In light of  _ that _ fate, you supposed sitting next to him and trying to not make it any more weird was a much better alternative.

    Eventually the warmth of the fire had fought off all traces of the frigid weather from your body.  It had even reached down into your bones, letting you realize just how exhausted you still were from your long day.  It was still dark outside, so you supposed resting some more was due. Besides, Nero was just sitting quietly on your left and making no attempts to engage you.  So you crossed your arms and bowed your head, resolving to sleeping sitting up in favor of staying by the fire. What you don’t realize is that when you’d finally succumbed to slumber, your horrible posture left no balance for you to remain upright.  Instead, you unconsciously drifted toward the closest thing to lean on; head hitting Nero’s shoulder and the side of your arm pressing against his.

    Naturally it startles him, almost making the demon jump up to his feet to reinstate a respectable and safe distance from you but he steels himself into remaining motionless, aside from his wing shifting away from resting on his shoulder when your head touched it.  He sits still, stealing little glances at your sleeping face every now and then, as if he’s afraid you’d wake up and catch him looking at you before he finally allows himself to start to relax. This is a first for him; having never met a human that would allow themselves even within eyesight of him, let alone one that would put themselves in such a vulnerable state willingly.  The thought causes something warm to spread through him, shocked to notice the illuminated parts of his body start to glow a golden hue instead of his normal pale blue light in pulsing intervals. Slowly, and with extreme care, Nero stretches his wing out enough to curl around your back for additional support, gently closing the clawed fingers of the tip around your shoulder to ever so slightly tug you closer before he too eventually drifted off to sleep.

 

    There’s a few things you could attribute to being woken up; the rays of the sunrise starting to just beam in, the numbness of your lower extremities from sleeping sitting up, the twinge in your neck from it leaning too far.  But the true cause that drug you out of slumber was the chill racing along your body and beginning to settle into your bones. Your eyes slowly drift open to examine the fire, seeing that it has died down to a pathetic little attempt of a flame and blink tiredly at it before shifting your head to get more comfortable on its resting place before realizing that you were  _ leaning _ .  On the demon!  You jerk away, face red, and ready to immediately apologize for invading his personal space even more, but he’s not even there!  You don’t know  _ who _ is sitting there; this blue coated  figure is hunched over with his head hanging forward and arms crossed loosely over his ribs in a similar posture you had fallen asleep in.  Your surprised noise of confusion was loud enough to startle the stranger awake in a single second.

    His icy eyes, unable to be hidden by the short silver spikes, were wild and wide as he too jerked away and immediately is swallowed up by a bright flash of blue light that moves over the entire length of his body in quick succession; leaving behind the demonic form you’d become acquainted with.  Even in this terrifying form, he looks worried.

    “What the--” you give him a once over, “I thought you were a demon!”

    “I am!” he growls in response, voice even more raspy and ethereal from being heavy with sleep.

    “Then what was  _ that _ !  That wasn’t a demon form!”

    “N-Nothing!” he insisted, poorly, since you clearly knew what you’d just seen.

    You scooted closer, purposefully invading his personal space, and looked him directly in his eyes.  They weren’t human--yet--the normal thin slit of his pupil a little dilated as the bright, fiery colors flicked around your face.  “Nero, are you...a halfling?”

    The frown creasing his mouth should have probably terrified you that he was getting ready to rip your throat out with either his jagged fangs or massive claws.  “I’m a  _ demon _ ,” he says with dark emphasis, eyes narrowing into glowing slits, as he leaned in himself to prove his scariness.

    Admittedly, it did make you back up out of his face, but you were still unconvinced, staring at him still, at his hair, his horns, the jagged bits and colorations that hadn’t been there before on his very human face only moments ago.  “Are you embarrassed of your human half?” you tried again, not letting up on your half-breed theory.

    Nero growled in response, the sound ominous and threatening and making your hair stand on end at the impending danger you were putting yourself in by antagonizing a demon of all things.  “What do you care?” he uttered in a gravelly voice, intently watching your reaction as if trying to read you.

    “Well...you have to admit it’s a pretty jarring difference…”  You gestured to yourself with a sweeping motion along your sides, “Wouldn’t you be surprised if you woke up and I was completely changed?”  His gaze moved down your body and back up as if contemplating his reaction in such a situation before he looked away with an annoyed click of his tongue.

    Without a word, the light that transformed him into this ghastly form erupted around him, filing over his body once more as the demonic appearance dissipated into shards of glass-like embers to leave behind a quite human looking Nero.  The length of his hair had drastically receded to a spikey mass of silver that looked somehow soft, jagged edges adorning his face and shoulders and the rest of him vanished in favor of the smooth expanse of skin. His eyes, still sharp and observant weren’t glowing angrily anymore, but that icy stare seemed to freeze your breath in your lungs once he slowly looked back at you.  You could still see the similar features from both forms, his jaw, his nose, his general face shape and his body had become smaller--and clothed--you thankfully noted. He appeared to be a completely normal human man...save for his right arm. That arm remained the same as it had been; clawed, dark and rough looking with raised scales and cracks that wrapped around like veins and glowed that mysterious blue hue.  Nero more or less glared at you as he watched you study him, assuming that you too were judging him; sitting there looking even more uncomfortable than before, as if he felt naked. When he felt that your eyes had been on him long enough, he shifted, putting his human hand over his right forearm like he wanted to cover it up.

“Why leave one arm?” you asked genuinely.

“It doesn’t change,” Nero huffed, voice...normal.  It was still gruff and an interesting baritone, but now he just sounded...human.  “Never has.” The look he caught you giving him held a lot more questions that you seemed conflicted on asking, or you at least didn’t know which to ask him to explain first.  So he beat you to what he figured was going to be the next one, “People see it. Judge it...judge me. It’s just easier to take on my true form. Keeps people away since half-demons are apparently even worse than a full-fledged one.”

Without realizing it, your expression softens as you notice him run his thumb back and forth over his demonic looking arm with subtle motions.  Nero doesn’t even seem to realize he’s doing it as he frowns at you, as if waiting for your judgemental words on him as well. “Isn’t that...lonely?”

    Something flashes through his eyes before he looks away again, that same annoyed tsk timed perfectly with the motion, and apparently not realizing the tint of pink settling in on his cheeks and the tips of his ears.

    You wonder how long he’s been living his life like this--afraid and lonely with no one in the world, it looked like, to turn to.  Reaching over, you gently cover his much larger, clawed hand with your own; getting startled right along with him when he jumps and tries to jerk his hand away.  You grabbing hold tightly and refusing to let him flinch away though makes him look up from your hand, gaze holding yours with a deep intensity you have a bit of trouble fully understanding.  But you can see  _ something _ in his eyes, something reserved yet almost desperate all at once.  “Hey, Nero,” your voice is almost a whisper as you smile warmly at him.  “I never thanked you for saving me.”

    His turbulent eyes drop down to your hand holding his still before carefully curling his long, clawed fingers around yours in return and looking back up at you; not bringing to attention how the icy blue of his arm started faintly fading into a gentle gold glow.  The corner of his mouth quirked up into a small, half little smile as he nodded, “Yeah...no problem.”

    Perhaps that old seer was right.  Perhaps you were the one who would remedy this situation after all...but, not the village's.


End file.
